Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett has helped identify acts for which former President Donald Trump could be convicted in his upcoming election fraud trial, a law professor has said.
On July 1, the Supreme Court issued a ruling in Trump’s immunity case, and Barrett sought to find a middle ground between the conservative majority, who allowed wide immunity for the former president, and the dissenting voice of Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who warned that the majority’s decision would allow Trump to commit crimes without restriction.
Randall Eliason, a law professor at George Washington University, said on Tuesday that Barrett had helped confirm which Trump acts in his election fraud indictment could be considered private.
He said distinguishing the former president’s official acts from his personal ones should not be a difficult task for Judge Tanya Chutkan, who is overseeing Trump’s election fraud case in Washington, D.C.
Eliason wrote on X, formerly Twitter: “Trump’s attorney at oral argument conceded that a number of the acts were private. Justice Barrett noted the same thing in her concurrence. I just don’t see this as this hugely difficult problem for Chutkan.”
Last year, Trump was indicted on four counts of allegedly working to overturn the results of the 2020 election in the run-up to the January 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. Trump, the front-runner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, has pleaded not guilty to all charges and has repeatedly said they are part of a political witch hunt.
Chutkan had frozen the election fraud case while the Supreme Court considered the presidential immunity issue. Newsweek has contacted Trump’s attorney for comment by email.
Barrett, a Trump appointee and moderate conservative, warned that the majority opinion would “hamstring” the prosecution by refusing to allow official acts to be used as evidence in cases where a president has broken the law with their unofficial acts.
Citing the example of presidential bribery, she wrote, “Excluding from trial any mention of the official act connected to the bribe would hamstring the prosecution.”
Barrett also rejected a claim by Trump’s legal team that putting forward an “alternative” group of state electors could be considered an official act of the president.
“Sorting private from official conduct sometimes will be difficult—but not always. Take the President’s alleged attempt to organize alternative slates of electors,” she wrote. “In my view, that conduct is private and therefore not entitled to protection.”
“In short, a President has no legal authority—and thus no official capacity—to influence how the States appoint their electors. I see no plausible argument for barring prosecution of that alleged conduct,” Barrett continued.
As Barrett sided with the majority, her opinion could be a powerful tool used by Smith when the Supreme Court’s ruling on Trump’s immunity is debated before Chutkan.
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
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